Editor’s Note: In this article, Mr. Nicola Bagalà explains a study that shows aged cells that usually resist reprogramming can be regenerated by reducing the level of Zeb2-NAT without harming the cells’ developmental potency. This article was originally published by the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation (LEAF).

Researchers have found that by manipulating a single RNA molecule, they can reverse some aspects of cellular aging and regenerate aged cells.

Old cells resist regeneration

As we grow older, our cells gradually age, leading to the development of various diseases. Therefore, inducing cellular regeneration is one of the approaches that researchers are using to combat the age-related diseases associated with cellular aging. Unfortunately, aged cells are often highly resistant to therapies aimed at inducing regeneration.

Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is responsible for the creation of cellular proteins. However, a special type of molecule called non-coding RNA is never made into protein. In fact, when they mapped the human genome in 2001, they discovered that only around 2% of RNA is actually made into proteins.

Now, researchers have found a way to bypass the resistance of aged cells to being regenerated and becoming functionally more youthful.

What the study found out

In a recent Nature Communications paper, a team led by Dr. Bruno Bernardes de Jesus of the Instituto de Medicina Molecular (iMM) João Lobo Antunes in Lisboa discusses a technique that allowed the team to achieve easier cellular reprogramming of old fibroblasts into pluripotent cells [1].

Fibroblasts are connective tissue cells in animals that synthesize both the extracellular matrix, which is a “scaffolding” made up of extracellular molecules that provides structural and biochemical support to cells, and collagen, which is the main structural protein of connective tissues in animal bodies.

The study showed that the fibroblasts of old mice express higher levels of the transcription factor Zeb2. A transcription factor is a protein that regulates the DNA-to-messenger-RNA transcription rate, and Zeb2, in particular, induces epithelial cells to transition to mesenchymal cells. Epithelial cells are one of the four basic tissue types of animal cells, whereas mesenchymal cells are multipotent stem cells that give rise to fibroblasts, among others.

The synthesis of Zeb2 is controlled by the ribonucleic acid Zeb2-NAT (NAT stands for “natural antisense transcript”). What the scientists demonstrated in this paper is that by knocking down Zeb2-NAT in old mouse fibroblasts, Zeb2 can be downregulated significantly, which, in turn, leads to an enhanced fibroblast ability to turn into pluripotent cells rather than mesenchymal cells. The difference is that while mesenchymal cells can turn into only a certain range of related cells, pluripotent stem cells can turn into nearly all types of cells.

The way the researchers silenced Zeb2-NAT was by transfecting the fibroblasts with certain ribonucleic acid sequences—in other words, they introduced these sequences into the fibroblasts’ nuclei to modify their behavior.

Essentially, what they demonstrated is that aged cells that usually resist reprogramming can be regenerated by reducing the level of Zeb2-NAT without harming the cells’ developmental potency.

Conclusion

This study results spotlight the role of non-coding RNA in the fine-tuning and expression of protein-coding genes involved in pluripotency, differentiation, and reprogramming.

This opens the door for the regeneration of aged cells and tissues in an effort to prevent or reverse age-related diseases caused by cellular aging.

Nicola Bagalà has been an enthusiastic supporter and advocate of rejuvenation science since 2011. Although his preferred approach to treating age related diseases is Aubrey de Grey’s suggested SENS platform, he is very interested in any other potential approach as well. In 2015, he launched the blog Rejuvenaction to advocate for rejuvenation and to answer common concerns that generally come with the prospect of vastly extended healthy lifespans. Originally a mathematician graduated from Helsinki University, his scientific interests range from cosmology to AI, from drawing and writing to music, and he always complains he doesn’t have enough time to dedicate to all of them which is one of the reasons he’s into life extension. He’s also a computer programmer and web developer. All the years spent learning about the science of rejuvenation have sparked his interest in biology, in which he’s planning to get a university degree.

About LIFE EXTENSION ADVOCACY FOUNDATION (LEAF)

In 2014, the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation was established as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to promoting increased healthy human lifespan through fiscally sponsoring longevity research projects and raising awareness regarding the societal benefits of life extension. In 2015 they launched Lifespan.io, the first nonprofit crowdfunding platform focused on the biomedical research of aging.

They believe that this will enable the general public to influence the pace of research directly. To date they have successfully supported four research projects aimed at investigating different processes of aging and developing therapies to treat age-related diseases.

The LEAF team organizes educational events, takes part in different public and scientific conferences, and actively engages with the public on social media in order to help disseminate this crucial information. They initiate public dialogue aimed at regulatory improvement in the fields related to rejuvenation biotechnology.

World Health Organization Puts the Elderly Back in the Picture – Article by Elena Milova

Editor’s Note: In this article, Miss Elena Milova explains the success the anti-aging community has had in influencing policy makers at the WHO in including several provisions related to aging, in their global strategy and action plans of the next decade. This article was originally published by the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation (LEAF).

Not long ago, we wrote about some complications involving the WHO 13th programme of work. In the initial version of this document, developed by the WHO working group in November 2017, the problems of the elderly were nearly completely overlooked. The joint effort of our community helped to bring this critical flaw to public attention.

During the meeting of the working group, it was announced that 90% of the comments received by WHO (out of 400) pointed out the need to set healthy aging as one of the priorities of the new programme of work. However, we didn’t know if our demand to focus on the implementation of the global strategy and action plan on aging and health would be fulfilled.

The good news is that the new draft programme published on the WHO site on November 5th includes several provisions related to aging. Our community managed to persuade these global policymakers to implement all activities listed in the global strategy to help society prepare for the Decade of Healthy Aging (2020-2030). Let’s have a closer look at these provisions.

15. The foundation of WHO’s work is SDG 3: ensuring healthy lives and promoting well-being for all at all ages. WHO is an organization focused principally on promoting health rather than merely fighting disease, and especially on improving health among vulnerable populations and reducing inequities. Leaving no-one behind, the Organization aims to give women and men, girls and boys, in all social groups, the opportunity to live not just long but also healthy lives. WHO will explore measuring this foundation of its work using healthy life expectancy, which could serve as one overarching measure aligned with SDG 3, complemented by the triple billion goal, which leads to three more specific priorities, each with overlapping one-billion people goals.

Healthy life expectancy (HALE) is an assessment of the period of time a person can live in full health. HALE is usually lower than total life expectancy, and the difference between HALE and total life expectancy is regarded as years of life lost to disease.

As the goal of our community is to prolong the healthy period of life by addressing the root mechanisms of aging and postponing age-related disease, the introduction of HALE as a way to measure WHO activities is a very good outcome. It is very hard to preserve health in older ages without addressing the underlying mechanisms of aging and implementing an extensive program that involves educating the public about healthy lifestyles. This choice of indicator means that WHO will strengthen its efforts to keep people healthy for as long as possible, which will ease the introduction of rejuvenation interventions once they are available, as it will likely be a cost-effective way to achieve a more favorable HALE.

16. Life expectancy at birth has consistently increased since the 19th century, largely due to socioeconomic developments and public health measures such as vaccination, nutrition and
sanitation. Today, socioeconomic, political, cultural, environmental and economic forces continue to drive changes in the burden of disease. However, efforts are needed to ensure that their impact is positive. Poor health literacy coupled with weak health-promoting policies make it difficult for people to make healthy choices for themselves and their families. Investment in health promotion and disease prevention allows countries to address economic concerns about the rising costs of the health system and enables potential savings if disease can be avoided.

The WHO draft programme of work refers here to the increasing burden of chronic, non-communicable diseases due to the increasing proportion of people age 60 and over. Indeed, it would be really hard to double or even triple healthcare and pension expenditures for many countries, especially taking into account the ongoing economic crisis. However, this is what aging societies will have to do, if HALE does not grow faster.

This is why WHO is only promoting evidence-based interventions that represent the “best buy” scenarios: the most realistic and cost-effective. When it comes to age-related diseases, which can last 20-30 years or longer, prevention could be much cheaper, and it is more humane, as this scenario would reduce unnecessary human suffering. Therefore, we could consider this provision of the new draft programme as supporting our efforts to introduce longevity lifestyles and even “soft” (careful and evidence-based) biohacking.

17. Healthy life expectancy has not increased at the same pace as life expectancy, and increasing age often brings increasing morbidity and reduced functioning, making healthy ageing an important focus. Most disability-adjusted life years in older age are attributable to chronic conditions and the accumulated impact of such conditions can lead to significant loss in function and care dependence in older age. At the same time, there is emerging evidence that healthy ageing depends on early childhood development and is epigenetically determined. Ensuring healthy ageing is an urgent challenge in all countries.

This provision once again underlines how important it is to focus on prevention. I would like to point out that if childhood is perceived as the foundation of healthy lifestyles, longevity advocates receive carte blanche for working with the younger generation. Activists could think of developing corresponding education programs for schools and universities, and this very provision can be a strong argument when offering such a program to educational authorities.

37. Ensuring healthy ageing is central to universal health coverage, just as it is to the other priorities of GPW 13. The number of people over the age of 60 is expected to double by 2050 and this unprecedented demographic transition will require a radical societal response. The Secretariat will support Member States to promote healthy ageing through the actions defined by the Global strategy and action plan on ageing and health (2016), as well as through the Decade of Healthy Ageing that is planned for the period 2020−2030. These actions include aligning health systems to the needs of older populations, with a special focus on enhancing the functioning of older persons and the management of chronic disease; improving access to medicines; developing systems of longterm care including community-based services; promoting palliative care, creating age-friendly environments; and improving measurement, monitoring and understanding of healthy ageing.

This provision is exactly what we were aiming for when calling the members of our community to take part in the Open Consultation or the Draft. As you remember, all mentions of the WHO documents related to aging were absent; this provision clearly shows that we achieved our goal! Even though the global strategyand action plan on aging and health may not be ideal in terms of rejuvenation research promotion, it helps member states navigate the field with more confidence. This global strategy, which we wanted so much to be the foundation of the draft programme provisions related to aging, contains a very important paragraph that every activist should know about:

105. Finally, better clinical research is urgently needed on the etiology of, and treatments for, the key health conditions of older age, including musculoskeletal and sensory impairments, cardiovascular disease and risk factors such as hypertension and diabetes, mental disorders, dementia and cognitive declines, cancer, and geriatric syndromes such as frailty. This must include much better consideration of the specific physiological differences of older men and women and the high likelihood that they will be experiencing mutimorbidities. This could also be extended to include possible interventions to modify the underlying physiological and psychological changes associated with ageing.

Conclusion

Dear friends, this is a victory! Our community managed to influence policymakers of the highest level: the World Health Organization. We managed to ensure that the new programme of work considers aging and age-related diseases to be an important issue, and the resulting global strategy and action plan on aging and health is an effective guide to helping our society adapt to population aging.

In terms of advocacy, this is a complete victory, which shows two important things. First, when we join forces, we can influence global health policy at the highest level. Our community became stronger, and our voice is being heard! Second, this victory shows that dialogue with the UN and its institutions, including decision-makers in these agencies, is possible, and it goes in the directions that we need: more focus on prevention and more focus on public health education related to aging.

I offer special thanks to Dr. Ilia Stambler for initially turning the attention of the community to this issue. I want to thank and congratulate all participants of the Open Consultation with this achievement. Of course, we are still at the beginning of our path to rejuvenation as a public health priority, but outcomes like this one make me believe that there are more victories to come. Let’s keep working, as the main reward is worth it: health, youth, and freedom from age-related diseases for all!

About Elena Milova

As a devoted advocate of rejuvenation technologies since 2013, Elena is providing the community with a systemic vision how aging is affecting our society. Her research interests include global and local policies on aging, demographic changes, public perception of the application of rejuvenation technologies to prevent age-related diseases and extend life, and related public concerns. Elena is a co-author of the book Aging Prevention for All (in Russian, 2015) and the organizer of multiple educational events helping the general public adopt the idea of eventually bringing aging under medical control.

About LIFE EXTENSION ADVOCACY FOUNDATION (LEAF)

In 2014, the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation was established as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to promoting increased healthy human lifespan through fiscally sponsoring longevity research projects and raising awareness regarding the societal benefits of life extension. In 2015 they launched Lifespan.io, the first nonprofit crowdfunding platform focused on the biomedical research of aging.

They believe that this will enable the general public to influence the pace of research directly. To date they have successfully supported four research projects aimed at investigating different processes of aging and developing therapies to treat age-related diseases.

The LEAF team organizes educational events, takes part in different public and scientific conferences, and actively engages with the public on social media in order to help disseminate this crucial information. They initiate public dialogue aimed at regulatory improvement in the fields related to rejuvenation biotechnology.

Alzheimer’s Drug Turns Back the Clock in Mitochondria – Article by Steve Hill

Editor’s Note: In this article, Mr. Steve Hill discusses an experimental drug, J147, for treating Alzheimer’s disease and also how Alzheimer’s disease is closely linked to aging. This article was originally published by the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation (LEAF).

J147 is an experimental drug that has been shown to treat Alzheimer’s disease, and it also appears to reverse some aspects of aging. It is also poised to enter human clinical trials in the near future, although how it works has been somewhat of a puzzle.

A new study published in the journal Aging Cell has changed all that, and the results are quite intriguing [1]. Researchers at the Salk Institute have solved the mystery of how J147 works and why it makes old flies, mice, and cells more youthful.

Rejuvenating mitochondria

The drug apparently works because it binds to a protein found in mitochondria, the powerhouses of cells; this, in turn, causes cells to function in a more youthful manner. Mitochondrial dysfunction is one of the hallmarks of aging and is thought to be a key reason why we age and develop age-related diseases [2]. This drug appears, at least partially, to address some of that dysfunction.

Finding the target of J147 was the key to revealing the link between Alzheimer’s disease and the aging process. It was the critical information the researchers needed and was holding the drug back from clinical trials.

Dave Schubert, head of Salk’s Cellular Neurobiology Laboratory, and his team originally developed the J147 drug in 2011. The team screened numerous plant-sourced compounds with the potential to reverse the cellular and molecular signs of aging in the brain. The drug was developed as a modified version of a molecule found in the spice curcumin, a common ingredient in Asian foods such as curry.

Since then, the researchers have shown that J147 can reverse memory deficits, increases the production of brain cells, and slows the progression of Alzheimer’s in mice [3]. However, at that point, they did not understand how J147 worked.

Finding the target

During the new study lead by Dave Schubert and Salk Research Associate Josh Goldberg, the researchers used a number of approaches to find out how J147 worked. They eventually identified that the target of J147 was the mitochondrial protein known as ATP synthase, specifically ATP5A, a subunit of that protein. ATP synthase is involved in the mitochondrial generation of ATP, which cells use for energy.

The researchers demonstrated that by reducing the activity of ATP synthase, they were able to protect neuronal cells from a number of toxicities associated with the aging of the brain. One reason for this neuroprotective effect is thought to be the role of excitotoxicity in neuronal cell damage.

Excitotoxicity is the pathological process by which neurons are damaged and killed by the overactivation of receptors for the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate. Think of it being a bit like a light switch being turned on and off so rapidly that it ends up causing the light bulb to blow.

Recently, the role of ATP synthase inhibition for neuroprotection against excitotoxic damage was demonstrated in a mouse study [4]. The second study showed that mouse models expressing the human form of mutant ATPase inhibitory factor 1 (hIF1), which causes a sustained inhibition of ATP synthase, were more resilient to neuronal death after excitotoxic damage. This data is consistent with this new J147 study, in which an increase in IF1 in the mice reduced the activity of ATP synthase (specifically ATP5A) and was neuroprotective.

ATP synthase is implicated in aging

ATP synthase has previously been shown to influence aging in C. elegans worms and flies. Given that aging is the greatest risk factor for developing Alzheimer’s disease, it is no surprise that the target of the drug is also involved in the aging process.

The team also revealed that by modulating the activity of ATP synthase, they could influence the levels of ATP and other molecules and were able to encourage healthier, more stable mitochondria during aging. Mice given the compound showed profound changes, appearing to look younger at a cellular and molecular level.

The researchers believe that these results are not only encouraging for the treatment of Alzheimer’s, they suggest that J147 may also be useful in treating other age-related diseases.

“People have always thought that you need separate drugs for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and stroke,” said Dave Schubert. “But it may be that by targeting aging we can treat or slow down many pathological conditions that are old-age-associated.”

With J147 having just completed the FDA required toxicology testing in animals, the next step is phase 1 human clinical trials, and the road to approval begins.

Conclusion

It is very heartening to hear important researchers suggesting that in order to treat age-related diseases, one needs to treat the aging processes themselves. This is the exactly what Dr. Aubrey de Grey and others have been saying for many years. It is good to hear more voices joining the call to tackle age-related diseases at their root: the hallmarks and damages where they all begin.

The process of age-related disease begins long before the familiar signs and diagnoses are made; by targeting the early processes that are not given specific disease names, we might yet defeat horrific diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, which rob us of who we are.

As a scientific writer and a devoted advocate of healthy longevity technologies Steve has provided the community with multiple educational articles, interviews and podcasts, helping the general public to better understand aging and the means to modify its dynamics. His materials can be found at H+ Magazine, Longevity reporter, Psychology Today and Singularity Weblog. He is a co-author of the book “Aging Prevention for All” – a guide for the general public exploring evidence-based means to extend healthy life (in press).

About LIFE EXTENSION ADVOCACY FOUNDATION (LEAF)

In 2014, the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation was established as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to promoting increased healthy human lifespan through fiscally sponsoring longevity research projects and raising awareness regarding the societal benefits of life extension. In 2015 they launched Lifespan.io, the first nonprofit crowdfunding platform focused on the biomedical research of aging.

They believe that this will enable the general public to influence the pace of research directly. To date they have successfully supported four research projects aimed at investigating different processes of aging and developing therapies to treat age-related diseases.

The LEAF team organizes educational events, takes part in different public and scientific conferences, and actively engages with the public on social media in order to help disseminate this crucial information. They initiate public dialogue aimed at regulatory improvement in the fields related to rejuvenation biotechnology.

Exercise is Currently the Best Way to Slow Down Aging – Article by Michael Falk

We have all heard that exercise is good for our health. However, it can not only keep you healthy, it can also slow down some aspects of aging. Some researchers even think that it might be possible to use this knowledge to develop new therapies against aging. While waiting for that to happen, we need to exercise in order to slow down the effects of aging.

How important is it to keep fit?

So, how beneficial is exercising? Well, one of the best studies conducted on this subject showed that women will live 5.6 years longer and men 6.2 years longer if they exercise between 1 and 2.5 hours per week [1]. This makes exercise a better lifestyle choice than any other, at least as long as you’re not counting avoiding downright dangerous behavior, such as smoking.

The main benefits of physical activity may come from better health for the heart. Exercise lessens the risk for many types of heart disease [2]. It is even more beneficial for people who already suffered age-related conditions, including stroke and coronary heart disease, and it is more effective than any known drug in preventing repeated episodes [3].

The key improvements also include increased muscle strength, stronger bones, better weight control, and improved cognitive function. This means less risk of age-related diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease, as well as lethal falls, which are a major risk for the elderly.

The conclusion is that exercise helps with a lot of different aspects of your health in several ways, and we can summarize its effects as improving quality of life and increasing healthspan.

How much exercise do you need?

More exercise does not always improve outcomes. Professional athletes exercise more than the rest of us, and they generally live longer than the average person [4]. However, correlation isn’t causation, and robust individuals are perhaps more likely to become athletes, instead of the other way around. There could even be negative effects from too much exercise, although that is far from certain.

Even moderate exercise leads to better health. Half an hour a day seems to be enough to see positive effects, and it is also a common recommendation for the minimum amount of exercise you should get. The biggest difference can be seen between people who hardly move around at all and people who get at least a little exercise a few times a week. Taking the stairs and walking short distances is clearly better than nothing. In fact, some studies show that even light activity, such as housework, can have an effect on mortality risk.

It should also be noted that there are different types of exercise and that these could have different benefits. Jogging increases your aerobic ability, which should, among other things, lead to better heart health. Lifting weights is an anaerobic exercise that improves strength and should bring other benefits, such as stronger bones. A lot of research about this has been done already, but so far, we don’t definitively know the optimal amount and type of training for each particular type of person.

Drugs to mimic exercise

Some of the positive effects have to do with the anti-inflammatory processes that occur when exercising [5]. Other mechanisms appear to be involved, although more research on these mechanisms is needed.

Since the advantages of exercise are clear, the idea has occurred to some researchers that it may be possible to mimic the effects of exercise without doing the hard work and getting sweaty. Research is now being conducted using drugs that target the same mechanisms to try to get the same benefits of exercise.

This typically involves adjusting a part of the human metabolism, which is not an easy matter. However, there have been at least some tentative breakthroughs already, and last year, a team found a drug that boosted the endurance of mice by roughly 70 percent [6]. Where this might lead in the future is not clear, but some positive effects may come from this research.

Will exercise lead to longevity?

Even though exercise is beneficial for your health, there is no guarantee it will keep you alive until you reach 100, although staying fit will almost certainly improve your chances. This is why if we want to remain in good health and live longer, we need to develop rejuvenation biotechnology and therapies that address the aging processes directly. That said, if you want to increase your chances of living long enough to see these therapies arrive, then exercise is the best option you have right now.

Michael Falk is a communication specialist with 15 years of experience writing about healthcare and technology. He has been an advocate of longevity research since 2013, when he started his longevity blog Unggamma (www.unggammal.se).

About LIFE EXTENSION ADVOCACY FOUNDATION (LEAF)

In 2014, the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation was established as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to promoting increased healthy human lifespan through fiscally sponsoring longevity research projects and raising awareness regarding the societal benefits of life extension. In 2015 they launched Lifespan.io, the first nonprofit crowdfunding platform focused on the biomedical research of aging.

They believe that this will enable the general public to influence the pace of research directly. To date they have successfully supported four research projects aimed at investigating different processes of aging and developing therapies to treat age-related diseases.

The LEAF team organizes educational events, takes part in different public and scientific conferences, and actively engages with the public on social media in order to help disseminate this crucial information. They initiate public dialogue aimed at regulatory improvement in the fields related to rejuvenation biotechnology.

Concrete Transhumanism – An Overview of Emerging Instantiations and the Transhuman Present Project

Transhumanism is a philosophy of lofty aspirations and universally applicable substance. Yet, when articulated at its usual level of abstraction, it is often misunderstood, especially if commonplace cultural connotations, myths, and fears from popular fiction inject nefarious undertones into what ought to be seen straightforwardly as a salutary overcoming of (deleterious) human limitations and a dramatic expansion of our potential through the application of science, technology, and rationality. Some accuse transhumanists of being a cabal of Illuminati who somehow secretly run the world. (How is this even possible, I wonder?) Others believe that transhumanists seek to turn humankind into the Borg from Star Trek or to create a dystopia where only a handful of rich Silicon Valley entrepreneurs will live forever at everyone else’s expense. Of course, no transhumanist actually even remotely resembles these stereotypes – and while it would have been quite helpful to have a few more Silicon Valley entrepreneurs as allies, the reality remains that the vast majority of transhumanists, including leaders of the movement, are people of ordinary means and relatively ordinary life situations. Transhumanists as people have much more in common with those who are unaware of, or hold misconceptions regarding, transhumanism than the latter persons think!

So what, then, sets transhumanists apart? Although we are generally people of ordinary means and circumstances, we are also people of extraordinary vision, and we see the world around us as in the midst of technological transformation which not only will have, but is already having, paradigm-shifting effects on everyday life. We are not beholden to status quo bias; we recognize that the present is a transitional state, and that life has not always been like this, nor will it always remain the way it is now.

Until recently, few efforts have been made to illustrate this observation concretely. But dedicated small associations of transhumanists are emerging to show the world what a transhuman present looks like. Through the projects they put into practice, the general public might get a glimpse of a transhuman existence, and in what directions it may head during the coming years and decades.

The Transhuman House and Foundation Library

If today’s technological capabilities were fully integrated into a residence, or even a room inside a residence, what would this look like? The Transhuman House, established in 2017, aims to answer this question. Version 1.0 of the Transhuman House opened to the public in Provo, Utah, in June 2017, even including an option for guests to rent a room via AirBnB. (See images from a 3D tour of Version 1.0 here.) The Transhuman House contains a showcase of emerging technologies, such as Nest, Alexa, and the Microsoft HoloLens. While observing and interacting with these examples of today’s devices – which either are already available or soon will become available for consumer adoption – visitors have the opportunity to read and study works from the Foundation Library – a wide-ranging collection of philosophical, scientific, technological, and fictional works exploring the ideas of transhumanism as well as visions of potential futures and specific pathways toward bringing those futures into being. In November 2017 the Transhuman House expanded into Version 2.0, moving into a larger (3-bedroom) building and adding touch screens and a giant touch-operable wall panel with which visitors can interact to learn about ongoing projects by transhumanist entrepreneurs and activists. Might most residences ten years in the future look somewhat like the Transhuman House? Now that there is a concrete illustration of what is possible even today, visitors have the opportunity to ponder the question of its wider applicability. The creators of the Transhuman House have given us a glimpse into what everyday life might look like with the emerging “transhuman” technologies more fully integrated into it. Some of these technologies are already available to consumers – so if you would like to create your own partial version of a “Transhuman House”, you may have the opportunity to begin setting up some of the components today.

Zero State – The Alternate Reality Game

The Zero State is a Social Futurist Community – described as “an organization formed in 2011 to work toward the establishment of a pro-technology, Transhumanist, distributed, virtual State. ZS’ motto is ‘Positive Social Change Through Technology’.” As one of the Zero State’s co-founders, Dirk Bruere, explains, the primary meaning of the name “Zero State” is “the lowest energy state of a system, the place to which everything returns when the energy runs out.” The Zero State has had several incarnations, the latest of which is an Alternate Reality Game (ARG), whose fictional premise is that the participants are representatives of twelve technologically advanced Houses, which have become the dominant influences in a post-dystopian late 21st century – a new era subsequent to the turmoil that (in this fictional timeline) would characterize the proximate future. The real-world application of the game involves members of the twelve Zero State Houses undertaking projects today which would enable the more salutary aspects of that distant future to take shape. Through the approach of gamification and interesting storylines woven into concrete projects, it is hoped that this format will motivate more people who are interested in the promise of emerging technologies and their societal impacts to take specific actions to realize the kind of world we would wish to see.

The U.S. Transhumanist Party, of which I am the Chairman, recently initiated a collaboration with the Zero State under the auspices of House Rhadamanth. I anticipate that the gamification format will be particularly useful in achieving projects where large numbers of distributed, volunteer participants are required for success. There is a strong potential for synergies between the Zero State and the U.S. Transhumanist Party’s Transhuman Present project, announced below.

The Transhuman Present Project

The U.S. Transhumanist Party represents a broad spectrum of members from throughout the world, who consider themselves transhumanists and who have expressed alignment with our three Core Ideals:

Ideal 1. The Transhumanist Party supports significant life extension achieved through the progress of science and technology.

Ideal 2. The Transhumanist Party supports a cultural, societal, and political atmosphere informed and animated by reason, science, and secular values.

Ideal 3. The Transhumanist Party supports efforts to use science, technology, and rational discourse to reduce and eliminate various existential risks to the human species.

The Transhuman Present project is our next step for reaching out to our members and others who consider themselves transhumanists and inviting them to show us what transhumanism means for them in their own lives. Participation is easy and available in a variety of formats. Here is how to get involved:

Create a post on any social medium with the hashtags #TranshumanPresent and/or #IAmTranshuman. To render us aware of the post, you can either link it to the U.S. Transhumanist Party Facebook page, or e-mail Chairman Gennady Stolyarov II at gennadystolyarovii [at] gmail [dot] com with your submission. Make sure that we are able to download or otherwise access the content of the post.

The post should contain some manner of specific illustration – for instance, a photo, video, drawing, diagram, audio file, or other interactive medium – showing how your life, environment, or aspirations can already be recognized as “transhuman” in terms of incorporating emerging technologies to expand your potential and the potential of those around you. The post may also include artistic elements that express your vision and aspirations for the future – as long as these elements are your original work or specific to your setting. (In other words, we would like to see how individual transhumanists have made their own lives more transhuman – not just reposts of images highlighting the work of famous individuals like Aubrey de Grey, Ray Kurzweil, or Elon Musk.)

The goal of the project is to collect many contributions from a diverse range of transhumanists and to illustrate to the public that the ideals we hold are accessible, capable of integration with ordinary life, and of practical relevance to living in today’s technological era. You are encouraged to use the tools of social media to promote your post and the hashtags #TranshumanPresent and #IAmTranshuman. Consider creative ways of spreading these messages (for instance, integrating the hashtags into videos or taking a photograph of yourself holding a poster beginning with “#IAmTranshuman because…”) The best submissions will focus on answering questions such as the following:

a. How are you using technology in ways that greatly broaden your potential compared to what was possible in even the proximate past?

b. How does your life look differently now as a result of emerging technologies? In what directions is your life being recognizably transformed?

c. What previously insurmountable barriers has technology enabled you to overcome?

d. What achievements can you show the world, which were possible due to the role that technology has played in your life?

Contributions to the project are open to the general public, and one does not need to be a member of the U.S. Transhumanist Party in order to contribute. However, the U.S. Transhumanist Party reserves the right to curate any submissions and to assemble videos, collages, or other media using the content therein. Furthermore, by making a submission, the content creator grants the U.S. Transhumanist Party and any of its Officers a perpetual, worldwide, non-exclusive right to use and distribute the content at their discretion, without any further requirement of additional permissions or express or implied compensation.

Because the U.S. Transhumanist Party is an all-volunteer, non-monetary organization, the contributions to the Transhuman Present project will not receive monetary compensation, but they are likely to receive public exposure and may benefit the contributor through increased recognition and inspiration for others to adopt the contributor’s ideas and values toward the realization of a better future.

Contributions to the Transhuman Present project are open until July 1, 2018, at which time the U.S. Transhumanist Party will compile the results into videos, collages, and potentially other media that will show the world the range of transhumanist endeavors and improvements to living standards that are possible today. While we are a young political party, and the road toward winning elections is a long one, we can profoundly influence public opinion much sooner by providing a reputable and appealing vision of what is possible if our principles are put into practice.

Gennady Stolyarov II, FSA, ACAS, MAAA, CPCU, ARe, ARC, API, AIS, AIE, AIAF, is the Chairman of the United States Transhumanist Party. Find out more about Mr. Stolyarov here.

Scientists Identify Genes Implicated in the High Regenerative Capacity of Embryos and ESCs – Press Release by Biogerontology Research Foundation

In the study, researchers used deep-learning techniques to analyze gene expression data in embryonic stem cell (ESC) lines at varying stages of development in order to characterize the gene expression profile of cells right at the boundary of the embryonic-fetal transition, when embryos become fetuses and experience a remarkable reduction in their regenerative capacity. In essence, the study’s objective was to hone in on those genes responsible for the remarkable regenerative capacities of embryos and ESCs.

“This is another important step in the progress of Insilico Medicine and indicates that its suite of products is developing rapidly, with significant commercial revenues not far off,” said Jim Mellon, Trustee of the Biogerontology Research Foundation, Chairman of Juvenescence Limited and a key partner of Insilico Medicine.

Mimicking the gene expression profile of cells prior to the embryonic fetal transition in adult tissues and organs is the concept underlying one of the central and most ambitious therapeutic modalities being pursued by AgeX Therapeutics, namely induced Tissue Regeneration (iTR). Therapeutic elaboration of the insights derived from this study could pave the way for in-situ tissue regeneration, and its application to ageing and age-related disease.

“induced Tissue Regeneration (iTR) is one of the most promising therapeutic modalities for enabling in-situ tissue regeneration proposed to date, and one that is likely to bring substantial healthspan-extending effects if implemented. This landmark study paves the way toward that bright future. Interestingly, in its identification of COX7A1 as one of the genes implicated in the remarkable regenerative potential of embryos and ESCs, the study also extends the purview of these findings to novel potential cancer therapies as well,” said Franco Cortese, Deputy Director of the Biogerontology Research Foundation.

The authors also developed effective methods of deriving biologically-relevant information from these profiles, identifying the most interesting genes characterizing the regenerative capacity of ESCs, and performed additional experimental validation to support the findings of the study’s deep learning analysis. Interestingly, one of the genes implicated in the embryonic-fetal transition that the study identified, COX7A1, is dysregulated in a diverse array of cancer types, including breast, lung, kidney, bone and muscle. As such, the results of this study could be used create novel cancer therapies as well.

“AI is quickly becoming the main driver of progress in so many fields of science, technology and human endeavor that it is easy for one to lose count. From healthcare to finance to governance, AI is galvanizing rapid paradigm shifts all around us. Insilico Medicine is rapidly establishing themselves as the leader of AI for longevity, and the combination of their deep-learning expertise with the assets for expert experimental validation and interpretation possessed by AgeX Therapeutics is a partnership that has yielded significant synergistic results in using AI to yield novel insights into the biology of aging and charting the path toward next generation healthspan-extending therapies” said Dmitry Kaminskiy, Managing Trustee of the Biogerontology Research Foundation.

The Biogerontology Research Foundation is a UK non-profit research foundation and public policy center seeking to fill a gap within the research community, whereby the current scientific understanding of the ageing process is not yet being sufficiently exploited to produce effective medical interventions. The BGRF funds and conducts research which, building on the body of knowledge about how ageing happens, aims to develop biotechnological interventions to remediate the molecular and cellular deficits which accumulate with age and which underlie the ill-health of old age. Addressing ageing damage at this most fundamental level will provide an important opportunity to produce the effective, lasting treatments for the diseases and disabilities of ageing, required to improve quality of life in the elderly. The BGRF seeks to use the entire scope of modern biotechnology to attack the changes that take place in the course of ageing, and to address not just the symptoms of age-related diseases but also the mechanisms of those diseases.

About Insilico Medicine, Inc.:

Insilico Medicine, Inc. is a bioinformatics company located at the Emerging Technology Centers in Baltimore with R&D resources in 6 countries. The company is widely recognized by the industry for applying next-generation artificial intelligence technology to drug discovery and aging research. For its pioneering work in the applications of Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) and Reinforcement Learning (RL) and collaborations with the pharmaceutical companies, it was selected as one of the Top 100 AI companies 2018 by CB Insights and Top 5 AI companies for social impact 2017 by NVIDIA. The company pursues internal drug discovery programs in cancer, dermatological, metabolic and CNS diseases, sarcopenia, fibrosis and senescence. Company website: http://www.insilico.com

About AgeX Therapeutics:

AgeX Therapeutics, Inc., a subsidiary of BioTime, Inc. (NYSE American: BTX), is a biotechnology company applying technology relating to cellular immortality and regenerative biology to aging and age-related diseases. The company has three initial areas of product development: pluripotent stem-cell-derived brown adipocytes (AGEX-BAT1); vascular progenitors (AGEX-VASC1); and induced Tissue Regeneration (iTR). Initial planned indications for these products are Type 2 diabetes, cardiac ischemia, and tissue regeneration respectively. For more information, please visit http://www.agexinc.com or connect with the company on Twitter or Facebook.

Editor’s Note: In this guest article, Pedro Villanueva outlines a new concept of pluslectic philosophy, which endeavors to be a method of thinking and forward-looking feedback (feedforward) which would characterize future advanced civilizations of enhanced humans. The U.S. Transhumanist Party publishes this article to motivate thought regarding how philosophical systems would need to evolve in order to recognize, characterize, and provide ethical guidance in a world of enhanced, augmented “plus-humans” – i.e., transhumans. This article was originally written in Spanish. The author’s translation from Spanish to English was edited further in a way that sought to preserve and reflect the author’s intent while restructuring various sentences to reflect the English rules of grammar.

What is the pluslectic? The term stems from the Latin “plus”, signifying “more”, “added”, and “positive”.

A philosophical method that differs from the classical dialectic of Hegel and Marx, pluslectic philosophy values the input of the positive facts of growth throughout the world.

First think what happens with society and history. Our world over time since the beginning of civilization has been almost dystopian, as said Slavoj Zizek, […] “The real thing is a grain of sand that prevents us from a functioning unimpeded; a shock traumatic that disrupts the balance of the symbolic universe of the subject.” [1]

With the development of capitalism, develops also nihilism; it refers to a “belief” or faith that all values are meaningless or useless and that nothing can be really known or communicated, since humans can never know the truth and should leave social deception.

Nihilists believe in these 3 things:

1. There is not reasonable proof of the existence of a “supreme ruler” or a “creator”.

2. The “moral truth” is unknown.

3. The universal ethics is impossible.

Nietzsche says the following: “What matter to me others? Others are only human. Be superior to humanity by the force, by the temple, for contempt… ” [2]

In the 20th century and early 21st century, there has deepened the social disorientation and the existence of a society without sense, with the philosophy of the postmodernism of Lyotard. Lipovetsky examines a “postmodern” society marked, according to him, by a separation of the public sphere, and at the same time a loss of the sense of the large collective institutions (social and political) and “open” culture based on the regulation of human relations. Grace, hedonism, customization of the processes of socialization, permissive education, sexual liberation, focus on mood all characterize such a society.

This vision of society poses a neoindividualism of a narcissistic type and, moreover, what Lipovetsky called “the second individualist revolution”. The Post-Structuralists, with the deconstruction approach of Derrida, and Paul Virilio, with his thought of the aesthetics of disappearance where speed rules in the political, economic and cultural realms of human existence, are examples of this phenomenon.

I’ll explain the evolution of the concept of modern dialectic in the main figures of the philosophers Fitche, Hegel and Marx.

For Johann Gottlieb Fichte, I, the subject, is derived from all and the logical principles logical of identity and denial, to assert oneself begets opposition – “not me” – and both are subordinated to a principle of total unity. As the self comes into contradiction with himself and opposition to the “not me”, it eliminates this opposition by limiting both flows in an endless process, which is formulated in the dialectic triad: thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. [3]

The German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel applies the term “dialectic” to his philosophical system and its logic focused on the future, contradiction, and change, which replaces the principles of identity and non-contradiction, by the incessant transformation of things and the unity of opposites. Hegel thought that the evolution of the Idea occurs through a dialectical process, i.e., a concept confronts its opposite and as a result of this conflict, rises a third synthesis. The synthesis is more loaded with truth than the previous two opposites. The work of Hegel is based on an idealistic conception of a universal mind that, through evolution, aims to reach the highest limit of self-consciousness and freedom. [4]

The German philosopher Karl Marx applied the concept of dialectic to the social and economic processes. The so-called dialectical materialism of Marx is often considered as a revision of the Hegelian system. This proposed a solution to a widespread problem of economic ends through three concepts: thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. The first was the source of the problem in this property of the capital concentrated in the bourgeois class. The second, proletarian, class, the creator of the value with their work, was stripped of all means of production. These two, according to Marx, will give as a synthesis communism, the social ownership of the means of production. [5]

Let’s bring to the discussion general systems theory and its importance. The advance of technology exposes the complexity of general systems theory when compared to the modern dialectic.

The general systems theory was conceived by Ludwig von Bertalanffy in the 1940s, in order to form a practical model for conceptualizing the phenomena that the mechanistic reduction of the classical approach to science could not explain. In particular, general systems theory seems to provide a unifying theoretical framework for the natural sciences and the social sciences, needing in so doing to employ concepts such as “organization”, “whole”, “globalization”, and “dynamic interaction”; the linear is replaced by the circular. None of this was easily understandable by the analytical methods of the pure sciences. The individual lost importance in favor of the interdisciplinary approach. [6]

During the 1930s, Wiener worked with doctors and engineers and examined the parallels between human beings and electrical systems. As a result of such research, important concepts of feedback were developed, with the researchers studying more closely those systems that incorporated them.

These concepts of feedback, by which information was introduced to machines, led to the emergence of Cybernetics as the adaptation different from the mechanistic theory. The circularity and feedback processes are passed to the common elements of entire system, and Wiener called them “anti-entropic local phenomena”.

The behavior of a driver’s car on a road would be a clear example of negative feedback, since the driver would receive information from the limits of the road that could produce correcting deviations with the steering wheel. The thermostat would be another example of negative feedback, to which we referred above.

Any feedback would take into account the information on past actions, and with them would determine further actions to follow, creating a structure more complex than the linear or circular causality.

About Feedback

In this type of chain, each link is modified and changes its interaction, and this modification occurs in a circular process known as feedback loop (feedback loop).

We can find examples of the previously articulated concept. Thus, a spider that paralyzes a fly with its stinger is involved in a process of spending a fixed amount of power from “a” to “b”; a jellyfish stinging a human hand can participate in a feedback loop from “a” to “b” and “b” (hand stung) back to “a” (in the form of circle). In the first model the effect of “a” on “b” is not returned to the system (a + b); in the second, the message part of the affected “b” (production) and returned to the system (a + b) as feed-back (received power). The general systems theory holds that transactions are circular and create spirals of exchange that become progressively more complex.

Feedback can be positive or negative.

Positive feedback: Growth of differences – “snowball” – when left to operate, leads to the destruction of the system.

Negative feedback (e.g., a thermostat): Leads to an adaptive behavior or having a purpose, a purpose.

In both cases, there is an anointing of transfer by means of which the received energy is converted into the result, which, in turn, is reintroduced into the system as information about the result.

In the case of negative feedback, the system uses this information to activate its homeostatic mechanisms and to reduce the deviation of the production system and thus maintain a “steady state”.

In the case of positive feedback, the information is used to activate the mechanisms of growth (morphogenic mechanisms) that lead to a disruption of homeostasis and a movement toward change – i.e., the positive feedback serves to increase the deviation of the production.

Therefore, when a system uses negative feedback, the system is auto-corrects and returns to the initial state (i.e., does not change). When a system uses positive feedback, the system goes to another state (change).

Andréi Korotáyev (Андрей Витальевич Коротаев, born in 1961) is an anthropologist, economist, historian, and sociologist, with important contributions to the world system theory and mathematical models of social and economic macrodynamics.

Andrey Korotayev’s major contributions belong to four areas: mathematical models of the dynamics of social, economic, and historical phenomena (cliodynamics).

In the field of cliodynamics, Korotayev proposed one of the most convincing explanations for the doomsday argument of Heinz von Foerster.

In collaboration with his colleagues Artemi Malkov and Daria Khaltourina, Andrey Korotayev showed that, until the 1970s, the hyperbolic growth of the world population was accompanied by a hyperbolic growth of the second degree of the world’s GDP, from which developed a series of mathematical models which both described this phenomenon as the theory of world system, the correlation between the hyperbolic growth of the world population and the hyperbolic of second degree of global GDP growth, observed until the early 1970s, corresponds to a positive feedback. (Positive feedback is one of the mechanisms of feedback by which outcomes or outputs of a system cause cumulative effects at the entrance, in contrast with the negative feedback, where the output causes subtractive effects at the entrance. Contrary to what you may believe, positive feedback is not always desirable, since the “positive” adjective refers to the mechanism, rather than the result.) The non-linear second-order relationship between demographic growth and technological development can be explained according to the following sequence:

•→Increased technological growth, growing the load capacity of the planet → population growth → more people → more potential inventors → acceleration of technological growth → acceleration of the increase of the carrying capacity of the planet → faster population growth → acceleration of the increase of potential inventors → faster technological growth → increasing the capacity of the Earth to support people… and so on. On the other hand, Korotayev’s research has shown that since 1970 the world system never develops hyperbolically; its development diverges more and more from the “regime of inflation” and currently is moving “away from singularity”, rather than “toward singularity.”

—

Marshall Goldsmith (born March 20, 1949) is an American leadership coach and author of management-related literature. He pioneered the personalized use of the FeedForward as a leadership development tool. The FeedForward assessment tool was created by Marshall Goldsmith with the intention of providing to individuals, teams, and organizations suggestions that help them, in the future, to make a positive change in their behavior. There is a fundamental problem with all types and forms of feedback: focus on the past, on what has already happened, not on the infinite variety of opportunities that could happen in the future. As such, the feedback can be limited and static, rather than dynamic and expansive. The FeedForward of Marshall Goldsmith helps you to predict and to focus on a positive future, not on a frustrated past. In training athletes using ‘feedforward’ (future feedback), the basketball players are taught to see the ball going into the ring and imagine the perfect shot. To give you ideas on how you can be even more successful, the FeedForward evaluative tool from Marshall Goldsmith can increase your chances of success in the future.

The pluslectic method is converted input, based on the theory of the system and concepts such as positive feedback, the feedforward, and Korotayev front-loading. The dialectical process evolves through concepts, hypotheses, ideas, and where the initial step is always positive (feedforward), accompanied with growth within a system of positive feedback, where the outcome of a positive feedback is one greater amplification which makes a small signal into a major change in the status of the system. Amplification generally grows in exponential systems in a first-order or second-order hyperbolic way.So evolution creates breaks in a positive and fast way, leading to shifts from one system to another system. Such systems are open to differences and are not controlled by negative feedback (which characterizes closed systems), where is the entropy of the system common.

The pluslectic is a philosophical view of how to operate a model of thinking of high civilizations of aliens or humans in the future, which would tell you as plus-humans, if this condition occurs with huge advances in engineering biogenetics, to reduce all the emotions and negative thoughts, where even before any negative events occur, humans would be capable of pre-feeding positively, with a vision of feedforward.

The pluslectic is a concept that is defined as the paradigm for highly developed post-humans, as opposed to the concept of dialecic from the 19th century, and the ideas of the 20th century, still in the generation of the great tales of humankind. Post-modernism and late modernity during the early 21st century are in crisis of change, setting the stage for the birth of new concepts oriented toward the future.

Images by Pedro Villanueva: Image #1 is his symbol for the Pluslectric; Image #2 is his artistic visionary representation of the concept.

Pedro Villanueva wasborn in Havana, 1974. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in San Alejandro. He writes in an approach to thought known as Pluslectic, which is in line with today’s world and the vision towards the future.

The purpose of this post is to facilitate member comments pertaining to transhumanism and the U.S. Transhumanist Party, which might not specifically fit the subjects of any other post or article on the U.S. Transhumanist Party website. This is the place for members to offer suggestions or converse about any areas of emerging technologies and their political, moral, societal, cultural, and esthetic implications. The general discussion thread is also an ideal location to suggest or propose platform planks that may be considered for future platform voting.

The U.S. Transhumanist Party will endeavor to open one of these general comment threads per quarter. This comment thread pertains to the months of January, February, and March 2018.

Type in your comments below. Please note that, to protect against spambots, the first comment by any individual will be moderated. After passing moderation, a civil commenter should be able to post comments without future moderation – although we cannot guarantee that the technical aspect of this functionality will work as intended 100% of the time.

It’s 2018, another year in this shared reality of ours. We’ve come a long way, perfecting our technological prowess as we continue our evolution into the post-human.

There are cyborgs out there. In fact, most of us are pretty much cyborgs at this point. However, it is indeed likely only some of us are truly beginning to tap into that potential.

Moon Ribas is known to the world as the Catalan avant-garde artist and a cyborg activist. Moon Ribas is one of those cyborgs, an example of the elegantly functional relationship between human and machine.

With an online seismic sensor directly implanted above her left elbow, she is able to perceive the vibrations of nearby earthquakes via data from a custom iPhone app that consolidates seismic activity from geological monitors around the world. Ribas then transposes this ‘seismic sense’ into bodily movement in her graceful performance known as Waiting for Earthquakes or into sound in her piece Seismic Percussion.

With the subdermal implant, Moon Ribas is able to further push the boundaries of perception and experience by means of personal augmentation. During the devastating 7.8 earthquake that struck Nepal in 2015, Ribas was awoken by a wave of vibrations in the middle of the night. She recalls it as the most peculiar of sensations, also describing it as her second heartbeat as she is able to empathize with the people experiencing the quake. This has lead her to advocate for a better understanding of the natural phenomena so that us humans may be able to better adapt to our own planet’s movements.

Along with Neil Harbisson, another fellow cyborg, they have co-founded the international organization Cyborg Foundation in the pursuit to help all the rest of us become post-human and to protect our rights as post-humans.

It is the insatiable creative thirst of humans like Moon Ribas that slowly pushes us to the inevitable brilliant future that is to come.

Moon Ribas is an artist and activist. More of her beautiful work can be found on her site.

Editor’s Note: In this article, Mr. Nicola Bagalà highlights various events of rejuvenation biotechnology in the year 2017. This article was originally published by the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation (LEAF).

This year has been pretty intense, with a lot going on both at LEAF and in the rest of the community. January saw the launch of the LEAF website, shortly followed by both the Lifeboat Foundation and Trust me – I’m a biologist partnering with us. Given that it’s been only a year, we’re amazed at how enthusiastic and supportive the community has been—and how fast it has grown, with nearly 30,000 Facebook followers late in December! We’re also very grateful to our friends at Fight Aging! for their encouragement, support, and appreciation for our work, including honoring us by featuring it on their website!

The Lifespan Heroes campaign was launched in the spring, and thus far, it has greatly helped us carry out our activities, especially in terms of web development—so thank you to all our generous donors!

In the spring, we also started our advocacy projects with global policymakers. During April 10-15, LEAF Board Director Elena Milova attended a training program conducted by the International Institute on Ageing (INIA) in Saint Petersburg, where she met and interviewed INIA director Dr. Marvin Formosa and former Head of the UN Programs on Ageing Dr. Alexandre Sidorenko.

The month of May was busy with conferences and networking; at the International Longevity and Cryopreservation Summit in Madrid, Elena Milova had the opportunity to interview life extension advocate Didier Coeurnelle, London Futurists Chair David Wood, Dr. Jose Luis Cordeiro, Senior Scientist at CONICET Dr. Rodolfo Goya (we hope to support his studies related to Yamanaka factors in 2018 via crowdfunding at Lifespan.io), and SRF’s Chief Science Officer Dr. Aubrey de Grey. Elena herself gave a talk about effective life extension advocacy methodologies; LEAF board member Paul Spiegel also gave a talk about the need for society to adapt to longer lives. In Paris, the International Cell Senescence Association (ICSA) held a conference discussing senescence triggers, physiological functions of senescence, and pathologies and therapies. We announced the event here.

Our Journal Club series was also launched at the end of May, for a total of eight Journal Club episodes this year, which you can watch here. The Journal Club is a monthly science show on which Dr. Oliver Medvedik hosts guests, and this show is supported by our patrons, the Lifespan Heroes. We broadcast this show live to our Facebook Page every month, where we invite the audience to ask questions and join in with the discussion.

Summer news

In the summer, LEAF and MMTP co-hosted a panel featuring Dr. Alexandra Stolzing, Dr. Aubrey de Grey, and Dr. Oliver Medvedik. This live broadcast included discussions about funding, research progress, and advocacy, providing some interesting insights into the field. They were joined by Alen Akhabaev, one of the project donors who supported the MMTP project on Lifespan.io, as well as Steve Hill and Elena Milova from the MMTP and LEAF.

The AgeMeter campaign was launched on Lifespan.io by Elliott Small in July, and in August, we celebrated the first birthday of our crowdfunding platform—you could say Lifespan.io’s birthday present was the MouseAge campaign launched shortly thereafter. The campaign was successful, and the MouseAge app is now ready and expected to be launched shortly. The use of AI is trending more and more in the field of aging research, so this app is certainly only one of many that will be employed in the future.

Juvenescenceby Jim Mellon and Al Chalabi—a thorough, investor-focused introduction to the science of aging and the world of rejuvenation biotech—was published on September 25. LEAF has published two reviews of the book, which you can read here and here.

Open Longevity ICO, a Russian project focused on conducting clinical trials of geroprotective therapies and introducing diagnoses of aging into clinical practice, was launched in September. It is currently entering the second phase of pre-ICO, and we wish Anastasia Egorova’s team good luck.

In October (which is traditionally considered the Longevity Month) we launched the #IAmTheLifespan campaign, inviting all our supporters to make videos describing what brought them to join our cause, and you can watch some of them here. To help out MouseAge, and for Inktober 2017, our volunteer Laura Weston launched a fundraiser offering her beautiful artwork as a reward for donors.

The Pathways to Healthy Longevity 2017 conference was organized on October 15th by Dr. Ilia Stambler, a famous longevity activist, in Bar Ilan University (Israel), with Prof. Nir Barzilai and Prof. Haim Cohen as key speakers.

In late October and early November, the popular YouTube channel Kurzgesagt published End Aging? and Cure Aging?, which were both created with help from the Lifespan.io team. We saw overwhelming support from old and new members of the community, showing that healthy life extension is much more popular with the public than one might think.

As MouseAge reached and surpassed its goal, news started to spread that WHO was planning to leave healthy aging out of the general programme of work 2019-2023; thanks to the advocacy efforts of the community, though, WHO has received plenty of feedback on the issue and may hopefully reconsider.

During November 8-10th, the TransVision conference was held in Brussels. It was organised by Didier Coeurnelle, the head of HEALES, the Healthy Life Extension Society. Among its other objectives, the Technoprogressive declaration presented at the conference mentions the defeat of aging; it’s good to see that this objective is now considered to be of primary importance by a growing number of organisations.

During December, LEAF took part in Project4Awesome; many amazing videos were made to support us, and we’re really grateful to the community for that. It was a truly beautiful display of generosity, and not the only one; thanks to many fantastic donors, including the mysterious Pineapple Fund creator, the SENS Research Foundation has smashed its funding goals for the year. You can read more about the December highlights here.

Coming up in 2018

In 2018, we will be working towards creating more major media collaborations with awesome content creators to spread further awareness about the problem of aging and the upcoming advent of rejuvenation biotechnologies.

Our web development team will be, and in fact already is, working on improving the overall user experience of our followers and scaling our systems up to meet the needs of a larger user base; we experienced a significant growth in this sense after our collaboration videos with Kurzgesagt were published, and we’re most definitely looking forward to this happening again!

Our Journal Club will, of course, continue discussing and providing commentary on the latest aging research news in the company of special guests from the biogerontology world. More livestream events are in the cards too, so keep an eye on our Facebook page, and subscribe if you haven’t already!

As the community grows larger, so does the need to establish and develop regional presences; our next objective will be starting the Russian chapter of LEAF to engage with a wider audience. Aging is a global problem, so the more communities and audiences we can get involved in the fight against age-related diseases, the better.

LEAF will naturally take part in as many events in the healthy longevity world as possible to keep our readers in the loop. A big must is definitely the March 15-17 Undoing Aging conference in Berlin, Germany, as is the April 22-26 Interventions to Extend Healthspan and Lifespan conference in Kazan, Russia. There will certainly be much exciting news to share, so stay tuned!

The Eurosymposium on Healthy Ageing—a scientific conference organized by the European aging research advocacy group HEALES—will be held in Brussels on November 8-10. It is likely that at least a few of the LEAF team will be at the event, and it is sure to be an interesting one.

Finally, of course, more exciting crowdfunding projects are in the works!

About Nicola Bagalà

Nicola Bagalà has been an enthusiastic supporter and advocate of rejuvenation science since 2011. Although his preferred approach to treating age related diseases is Aubrey de Grey’s suggested SENS platform, he is very interested in any other potential approach as well. In 2015, he launched the blog Rejuvenaction to advocate for rejuvenation and to answer common concerns that generally come with the prospect of vastly extended healthy lifespans. Originally a mathematician graduated from Helsinki University, his scientific interests range from cosmology to AI, from drawing and writing to music, and he always complains he doesn’t have enough time to dedicate to all of them which is one of the reasons he’s into life extension. He’s also a computer programmer and web developer. All the years spent learning about the science of rejuvenation have sparked his interest in biology, in which he’s planning to get a university degree.

About LIFE EXTENSION ADVOCACY FOUNDATION (LEAF)

In 2014, the Life Extension Advocacy Foundation was established as a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to promoting increased healthy human lifespan through fiscally sponsoring longevity research projects and raising awareness regarding the societal benefits of life extension. In 2015 they launched Lifespan.io, the first nonprofit crowdfunding platform focused on the biomedical research of aging.

They believe that this will enable the general public to influence the pace of research directly. To date they have successfully supported four research projects aimed at investigating different processes of aging and developing therapies to treat age-related diseases.

The LEAF team organizes educational events, takes part in different public and scientific conferences, and actively engages with the public on social media in order to help disseminate this crucial information. They initiate public dialogue aimed at regulatory improvement in the fields related to rejuvenation biotechnology.